Differentiation Station Assignment - Week 7

[Noreen]

Students learn at different rates and in different ways. Technology
enables is to create new routes to learning and address multiple
learning needs. The following website will help me stay on track in my
5th grade tech class. http://educapes.com/sessions/pilot/index.htm As
stated on this website pilot's and teacher's jobs are similar, bith
are providing a safe and successful journey and noth need an effective
plan. The site taught me that even though i have a lesson plan it is a
good idea to go beyond those plans and develop material that will
address a variety of learners and situations.

I was introduced to blogging through Walden. I started my own blog
several classes ago and I am so happy that I have that blog. It is
something I created that will be available for days, weeks and months
to come. I look at it as a resource and I look at this tool as a
wonderful resouce for my students. One person in our class introduced
me to http://kidblog.org/home.php and I plan on implementing this next
school year or maybe, just maybe this summer when I have to teach
language arts in summer school. Blogs are the newest way to promote
reading, writing and thinking in all content area and grade levels.
Through this site I have learned how to create and integrate blogs
into my 6th - 8th grade gifted and talented classes, which cover,
math, science, social studies and language arts.

Some other ideas/lessons I would like to try using is skype, audacity
and voki's. I have already contacted and had a skype video conference
with 2 high schools in the area to talk about using skype in the
classroom. We have started the ball rolling with our tech department
hooking up cameras and uploading skype so the students can collaborate
on projects, talk about what life is like in the high school and
bringing a museum to life right in our classroom. The Smithsonian
American Art Museum has a distance learning program called Artful
Connections. Free of charge, museum docents lead the study of U.S.
history and culture using their extensive holdings of American art via
real-time videoconferencing. I have already talked to the 8th grade
social studies teacher and she is excited about doing a project
upgrade gifted and talented class with the new program.

All the ways listed above could not have been possible with out this
class. I will use technology to provide my students with instruction
that meets their diverse learning needs based on the use of links in
the Differentiation Station.